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Hey guys, I recently bought a 94' Legacy L Wagon with 245xxx on the motor. In the last week or so I have been driving it fine. It's got a few issues, but the main one I am concerned about is I noticed the main crackshaft pulley has a wobble to it at low RPMs and it's making a noise when it wobbles. Just a touching noise. Now when I rev the motor past 2500 the pulley looks straight, obviously it's not but it looks like it's rotating fine at higher RPMs.

So my question is what should I be doing to get this resolved? I don't know too much about how to rip apart this engine but I have a friend who is very experienced on EJ22's that can help. Can I just replace that pulley?

You can just change the pulley, easy fix. All you need to do is pull fans off and the belts off and the bolt that holds it on and wiggle it off,and replace.

It may be too that the pulley wasn't put on straight (I did this once on accident, i know there is a notch don't ask me how haha). You may need to pull the radiator out to have room, but thats really simple. Get yourself a 22mm socket, a half inch breaker bar, and a long piece of pipe. Attach everything to the crank pulley bolt and make sure the pipe is on the right side of the motor and then give it one or two quick cranks (dont let it start). This will loosen the bolt to change the pulley.

Read this also

http://bbs.legacycentral.org/viewtopic. ... nes+pulley

Thanks for the information guys. Now what about the belt that's on there? Will that just slip off?

The powersteering and alternator have their own belt tensioner. While the a.c. has another. For the alternator belt you should first loosen both alternator mounting bolts then start to crank on the tensioner bolt. Tensioner bolt points towards the ground on the left side of the alternator. Once it's loose the belt should slip off. A.c. belt is similar, but it has a separate tensioner.

Mine did the same thing. Turns out mine damaged some of the things behind it and caused the crank sensor to read bad causing a lot of issues for me. Wish I caught it sooner

I would inspect the crank keyway and woodruff key when you have the pulley off, your pulley is most likely not bent. I see this all the time at work, people tend not to torque the crank bolt tight enough, so the bolt starts to loosen, then the pully begins to wobble, chews up the key and keyway. If you don't catch it in time, it can cause some serious damage to the crank then your SOL. I always torque mine down and use blue lock tight to ensure it doesn't happen. The second Legacy i ever bought had it happen and the crank was junk so I put a different motor in it, i bought the car for 50 bucks though so it was worth it.

I bought the car for $1200 bucks on CL. Hopefully it didn't damage the crank. How can I tell if the crank is damaged? Tomorrow i'm probably going to be taking it off and inspecting it.

bumpity bump. can anyone tell me how to tell if my crank is bad? or am I just going to have to find another pulley, install it, and then see?

You'll be able to tell when you pull the pulley off. There's a woodruff key that locates the pulley. If it's chewed up, then it won't be able to hold the new pulley in place.

I found a 'WRX Lightweight Pulley' on Craiglist for $50 which beats the hell out of $149 plus shipping. The guy said it's a chrome aftermarket pulley he never put on he's just trying to sell it. He wants $50 for it, what i'm wondering is if it will fit on an EJ22? I have looked and most pullys for a WRX are compatible with Legacys and Imprezas for 94'. What do you guys think?

There's no reason it shouldn't fit.

It will fit, check to see if its an underdrive pulley or not.

You don't want a stupid underdrive pulley so check to make sure its oem size.

what's an underdrive pulley? sorry if this is a stupid question.

Undriven pullies were the "rage" in the early 2000's. They are smaller diameter pullies than stock. This effectively reduces the effort the engine uses to drive the accessory items like alternator, AC, PS. The issue with this those accessories don't spin at the speed they need at idle so you can get things like dimming lights, harder PS, and AC that doesn't work well.

Pulleys - and woodruff keys - are easy to find used @ the wrecking yards. Get them b4 you pull the old one off so you only have to take it apart once. If the key on the crank shaft is bad, you may be screwed anyway and @ least you don't have $$ into a new one. But if only the key is damaged and not the crank shaft, you can replace the key and pulley and maybe get lucky.

I didn't know the key can be removed 'til my last EJ22 tear down...live and learn.

Half moon woodruff key:



TD

Ahhhhhh I see. Good information. I will be driving the Legacy to pick it up so i'll make sure the pulley is the same diameter as the OEM one.

Did you tighten the one you're driving first? If the pulley is still on there, you're probably fine, but if you keep driving it as it loosens, it's likely to come off and cause damage when it does. You also don't need a full keyway if it is damaged. As long as there's enough meat left to the keyway to hold the key straight, a chip in the crank will be fine. All the manuals say 90 ft/lbs, I believe, but you want 110-120.

Yup 90 and it will come loose. 120 ft lbs is what I do. I did 90 once and it came loose and tore up my crank pulley.

The pulley isn't loose, it's either warped of the key is screwed up. Or maybe the crank inside is warped? I just hope when I put the new one on, it's not wobbling. Otherwise i'm running the engine into the ground and then doing a turbo swap.

Alright I bought a pulley. It's slightly smaller.. It was only 25 bucks though. I already drove way far out to meet the dude. My guess is its an Underdrive pulley. In that case, where do I find a belt that fits the pulley? Can I just use the belt tensioner to remove slack? This is only a temp fix until I can afford a GrimmSpeed lightweight pulley.

Probably just adjust the belts.

Ok, having the same wobbling crank pully issue on my sedan. I have to ask, is the woodruff key supposed to go all the way to the end of the crank? The one on my sedan doesn't and I'm not sure if its fine or not.